Favorite Silent Film Comedian?

[elperromagico]

[terrya]

1. Buster Keaton. "The General" is a classic.

I always thought Buster Keaton was the more physical comic.

[Cooley Hurd]

2. Damn... I think I love Keaton/Chaplin/Lloyd equally...

...but when it comes down to brass tacks, I guess I love Keaton ever-so-slightly more than the other two.

I never got Harry Langdon & that whole man-child schtick. :shrug:

[tridim]

3. Off topic, but not really

I was watching a Chaplin biography last night and was amazed how much he looks like Jon Stewart. Anyone else notice the resemblance?

I can't decide who to vote for in the poll, either Keaton or Chaplin. Both were geniuses.

Edit: Holy crap, they're absolute twins!

[elperromagico]

4. Hmm - there is a certain resemblance,

now that you mention it. :hi:

[Kahuna]

8. John McCain in his younger days also looks like Chaplin..

nt

[sir_captain]

13. Wow

that's incredibly true

[Minstrel Boy]

5. Big Keaton fan here.

The Navigator and Sherlock Jr are favourites.

I think it must have been a privilege of growing up Canadian in the sixties to be treated to repeated classroom screenings of The Railrodder, which Keaton made for the National Film Board of Canada shortly before his death. There's a wonderful documentary about the making of that film, called Buster Keaton Rides Again, which is even more entertaining.

[Love Bug]

6. Don't forget, Laurel and Hardy started in silents

They are some of the very few who not only survived the transition to "talkies," but actually thrived and exploited the medium.

I love Chaplin, too--anyone catch any of his movies last month (March) on Turner Classic Movies? He was "Star of the Month." And Buster Keaton was fabulous as well. I like Harold Lloyd, too.

FYI - Turner Classic Movies shows silent movies on Sunday Nights at midnight. They also sponsor a contest for composers to score a silent film.

[sir_captain]

7. Chaplin by far

he is the greatest genius in the history of film. I love Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd as much as the next guy, but Chaplin was on a completely different level as an artist. City Lights is way better than anything else from that era, in my opinion.

[Kahuna]

9. Agree, agree agree agree. Chaplin rules.

nt

[sir_captain]

11. Heh...

I'm glad to see there's someone who shares my taste! :-)

[Minstrel Boy]

10. An interesting distinction:

I agree, Chaplin was on a different level as an artist, yet I think Keaton was a superior comedian.

Keaton was a comic genius. Chaplin was just a genius.

[sir_captain]

12. You could have something there

That's an interesting way of looking at it. I think I may even prefer Harold Lloyd's work for pure comedy--his physical work is really spectacular.

It's also interesting that people think of Chaplin as this keystone cop style clown, and have no real conception of what he was actually all about.

[elperromagico]

14. I look at it this way: I watch Keaton to laugh.

I watch Chaplin to laugh/cry. I can't sit through The Kid without bawling my eyes out :cry:.

So, I prefer Keaton as a pure comedian, and I admire Chaplin for his ability to arouse many emotions within a person. But that's just me.

[Minstrel Boy]

15. True. Sometimes Chaplin's sentimentality is just what I need.

For me, it's that final dissolve in City Lights. Gets me every time!

Last week, I listened again to a recording of Chaplin's final speech in The Great Dictator. It always gives me the shivers.

Some of it:

Greed has poisoned men's souls - has barricaded the world with hate; has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed.... Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me I say "Do not despair".

Soldiers - don't give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you and enslave you - who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel, who drill you, diet you, treat you as cattle, as cannon fodder. Don't give yourselves to these unnatural men, machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts. You are not machines. You are not cattle. You are men. You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don't hate - only the unloved hate. Only the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers - don't fight for slavery, fight for liberty.

...

You the people have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness. You the people have the power to make life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy let's use that power - let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give you the future and old age and security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power, but they lie. They do not fulfil their promise, they never will. Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfil that promise. Let us fight to free the world, to do away with national barriers, do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men's happiness.

Look up! Look up! The clouds are lifting - the sun is breaking through. We are coming out of the darkness into the light. We are coming into a new world. A kind new world where men will rise above their hate and brutality. The soul of man has been given wings - and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow - into the light of hope - into the future, that glorious future that belongs to you, to me and to all of us. Look up. Look up....

http://www.chez.com/lookuphannah/chaplinDictEn.html

[elperromagico]

16. Kick for the nighttime crowd.

:kick: